Grand Canal

The Canal Grande, known to
English-speaking visitors as the Grand Canal, is the main
aquatic thoroughfare in central Venice. The S-shaped waterway follows an ancient
riverbed from the Tronchetto parking
island, the Piazzale Roma transit center, and
the Santa Lucia railroad station
station to Piazza San Marco and St. Mark's Basin. The canal is about 4 km or 2.5
miles long, with a width that varies from 30 to 70 meters (98 to 230 feet).

The
best way to see the canal is to ride the No. 1 vaporetto from the
Piazzale Roma or the railroad station in the direction of San Marco--preferably
in the evening, when the daytrippers have gone home and the palazzi along the
canal are floodlit or illuminated from within. If you're on one of the older
boats with an open bow, sit up front; otherwise, grab a seat in the covered
open-air section at the boat's stern, beyond the doors at the rear of the
vaporetto's enclosed passenger compartment.

As
the water bus zigzags between stops on both sides of the canal during its
40-minute journey from the Piazzale Roma to San Zaccaria, you'll pass under
three bridges and see dozens of palaces that were built from the 12th to 18th
Centuries.

Another
way to see the canal is from the bridges that cross it. The Ponte di Scalzi is
just upstream from Venice Santa Lucia
Railroad Station; the Rialto Bridge is about halfway up the canal, just
after a sharp bend, while the Accademia Bridge is the last bridge across the
canal before St. Mark's Basin. (The newer Ponte della Constituzione, which most
Venetians call the "Ponte di Calatrava" or Calatrava Bridge after the architect
who designed it), crosses the Grand Canal between the
Piazzale Roma and Santa Lucia Railroad Station.)

Go the top of any bridge, find a place at the railing, and watch the constant
stream of vaporetti, barges, water taxis, police boats, ambulances, gondolas,
and other boats.

Finally,
if you'd like to ride a gondola but
aren't willing to spend €80 or more for the privilege, you can cross the Grand
Canal in a traghetto gondola ferry for the price of a coffee. (A traghetto crossing is the cheapest transportation bargain in Venice.)
Consult your map or follow the nearest "traghetto" sign to a boat landing.